Monday, November 1, 2010
Werewolf Boy
The boy,Prithviraj Patil, the son of a well-to-do farmer in Sangalwadi near Sangli, is otherwise a healthy normal child. The facial hair, which is up to three-inches (8 cm) long may look awful, but it does not induce any itch or rash on the skin and it is not accompanied by any odor or skin disorder. "Hairy nevus, where a person has patches of excess hair growth or hirsutism, is not uncommon. But hair persisting all over the body is very rare", said plastic surgeon Vinay Saoji."Though you have not come across such cases or its documentation anywhere, you suppose options like epilation could be tried out to rid the boy of the embarrassment", Saoji told IANS.Such traits, reminding us of real or supposed evolutionary lost characteristics are called atavisms. They usually appear because genes for previously existing phenotypical traits are not discarded from the genome, but often preserved and just inhibited by our DNA. Even if these genes are not expressed, a mutation can reactivate them.Atavisms that have been found in humans are for example babies born with a vestigial tail, named "coccygeal process", "coccygeal projection", and "caudal appendage", but other atavic traits in humans can be the presence of large, ape-like canines, the development of claws instead of nail or the presence of more than one pair of mammary glands.Atavisms have been also signaled in animals: whales and dolphins with small hind fins (showing clearly that they evolved from four limbed land mammals), or extra-toes in horses, showing that their ancestors had 5 fingers and toes like the rest of the mammals.
Ultrasound & Heart Disease
Clarence Dally (1865-1904), assistant to industrialist Thomas Alva Edison. The first recognized American X ray fatality.
Soon after the discovery of X rays in 1895, both men repeatedly exposed themselves to x rays in popular demonstrations and investigations of the exotic new imaging technology. Mr. Dally tested his X ray equipment on his own hands.
X ray "burns" on his hands turned cancerous. The cancer spread throughout his body and was ultimately fatal despite many efforts to cut out or otherwise treat the disease.
The discovery of x radiation blew everybody's mind; it was totally unexpected. Thomas Edison jumped right in and tried to exploit this unprecedented power to see inside solid bodies. He underestimated his ignorance, fatally. Of course, no one knew what effects the new rays could have on the human body. Fortunately for Edison, his blunder only caused him permanent persistent discomfort.
His main x-ray technician, Clarence Dally, who worked closely and consistently with the newly devised apparatii, was not so lucky. As we know now, you can absorb a large amount of X rays without any immediately visible signs. If the dose is spread out over a long enough period (say over days or weeks rather than minutes or seconds) you could conceivably take enough to kill you without feeling it . Eventually, like so many other unwitting "pioneers" who spent their lives on the new and magical X rays, Dally noticed what's euphemistically known as X ray "burn" . By the time the burns showed up the damage was already potentially fatal in the years to come. Dally didn't stop even as his condition grew worse. He even kept working at the infernal machine when he knew his hands were cancerous. I won't go into the gruesome details, but he wouldn't stop and neither did the cancer.
Soon after the discovery of X rays in 1895, both men repeatedly exposed themselves to x rays in popular demonstrations and investigations of the exotic new imaging technology. Mr. Dally tested his X ray equipment on his own hands.
X ray "burns" on his hands turned cancerous. The cancer spread throughout his body and was ultimately fatal despite many efforts to cut out or otherwise treat the disease.
The discovery of x radiation blew everybody's mind; it was totally unexpected. Thomas Edison jumped right in and tried to exploit this unprecedented power to see inside solid bodies. He underestimated his ignorance, fatally. Of course, no one knew what effects the new rays could have on the human body. Fortunately for Edison, his blunder only caused him permanent persistent discomfort.
His main x-ray technician, Clarence Dally, who worked closely and consistently with the newly devised apparatii, was not so lucky. As we know now, you can absorb a large amount of X rays without any immediately visible signs. If the dose is spread out over a long enough period (say over days or weeks rather than minutes or seconds) you could conceivably take enough to kill you without feeling it . Eventually, like so many other unwitting "pioneers" who spent their lives on the new and magical X rays, Dally noticed what's euphemistically known as X ray "burn" . By the time the burns showed up the damage was already potentially fatal in the years to come. Dally didn't stop even as his condition grew worse. He even kept working at the infernal machine when he knew his hands were cancerous. I won't go into the gruesome details, but he wouldn't stop and neither did the cancer.
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